Rock Flower Anemone Information and Appreciation Thread

[SeaFurn]

4 hours ago, seabass said:

I assume that lower flow and no or limited filtration help both in breeding and in survival of the babies.  I imagine protein skimmers filter out the sperm, and mechanical filters (along with stronger flow) can capture the babies (as I pictured above).  Currently I'm running both a skimmer and mechanical filtration in my RFA tank, so I'm kind of surprised to find any babies.

I bet your right that no or limited filtration might be better. 

I do run a skimmer on my tank but turn it off when I catch a spawning occurring.  I also think my low flow may help keep the babies in the tank right after they are born rather than through the overflow into the filter sock. 

 

I think your best bet, if possible, is to put them on a rock that doesn’t get blasted with flow, gets moderate light and 🤞. Maybe they’ll find a spot they like and stay put and grow. 

[seabass]

I've had some babies grow to maturity.  It's quite possible that these are second generation babies.

[SeaFurn]

5 minutes ago, seabass said:

I've had some babies grow to maturity.  It's quite possible that these are second generation babies.

That’s so awesome!

Keep us posted. 

[DSFIRSTSLTWATER]

I now have 4....hopefully I'll get lucky and get some spawning 

[jet915]

22 hours ago, seabass said:

So just before the lights came on this afternoon, I saw a baby RFA (not the ric ) caught in the holdfasts of some Caulerpa prolifera.

 

So I decided to check the filter.  Here's another baby.

 

I was able to carefully remove it from the filter.

 

My tank isn't currently that RFA baby friendly (too much flow), so my hopes for survival are fairly low.  Just curious, for you that have baby RFAs, what type of flow do you have?

Wow, those are some good eyes, is that what they look like when just born?  I only notice them when I start seeing tentacles....

[seabass]

18 minutes ago, jet915 said:

Wow, those are some good eyes, is that what they look like when just born?  I only notice them when I start seeing tentacles....

That's about as small as I've seen them (but not all that unusual).  Sometimes they are a bit larger.

 

Unbelievably , the first time I saw RFA babies (probably more than a decade ago), was just after I got done fighting a flatworm outbreak.  The tank was full of baby RFAs.  Keep in mind that this was before I even knew breeding was possible.  Anyway, I didn't even look at them (just saw a bunch of small critters and assumed they were flatworms) and siphoned them all out (maybe more than a hundred, IIRC).  Later I saw something like 4 more, looked at them more closely, and realized that they were tiny anemones.  I could have kicked myself for discarding all of those little gems.

 

Anyways, they have had intermittent babies since then, but never the quantity of that first batch.  I'm almost sure that the large shallow tank, drilled for a sump but running less than 10x turnover through the overflow (but with a skimmer) was a excellent breeding tank.  I can't remember the flow rate of the actual display, but it wasn't super high.  Also, the tank was exposed to skylights (which provided moonlight to possibly synchronize breeding).  Unfortunately, this was a temporary location, and I no longer have the tank (or a skylight lit fish room).

[Element03]

Great forum and awesome pics to drool over.

[KW NANOREEF]

I love my RFA! Great nems that don’t move around like regular nems.

[holy carp]

What is generally the timing of RFA spawing?  Doesn't it follow some lunar or seasonal cycles?

[seabass]

1 hour ago, holy carp said:

What is generally the timing of RFA spawing?  Doesn't it follow some lunar or seasonal cycles?

Good question, I'm interested in how others will answer this as well.  However, I believe you are right.  While I've had spawning events without visible moon cycles, my biggest spawning event occurred under sun tube skylights (where the moonlight would change from day to day).  I also suspect that temperature might also play a role.  It'd be great if we could really dial in the conditions that trigger spawning.

[SeaFurn]

18 hours ago, holy carp said:

What is generally the timing of RFA spawing?  Doesn't it follow some lunar or seasonal cycles?

That's been the theory.  Here's how my experience stacks up against that beginning mid-last year:

 

Seasons of 2017:

SUMMER SOLSTICE - June 21

      No Spawns - tank was probably too new or nems not mature enough

FALL EQUINOX - September 22

       Spawn Oct 2

       Spawn Nov 22

       Spawn Dec 13

WINTER SOLSTICE - December 21

 

Seasons of 2018:

SPRING EQUINOX - March 20

       Spawn May 6

SUMMER SOLSTICE - June 21

       Spawn July 28

 

Now I'll wait to see what happens around

FALL EQUINOX - September 22

WINTER SOLSTICE - December 21

 

So there have been a couple of spawns that have been near the solstices and equinoxes but it's hard to draw any conclusions at this point.  I'll continue to track it when I catch it occurring.

Here are some other observations I have made based on my experience - for general knowledge sharing:

Even though I have a fixed lighting schedule, given the placement of my tank, it's still influenced by actual sunrise and sunset times.

Spawning has occurred in the evening hours (6pm-9pm) - sometimes the lights were still on, and other times the lights were off

It's occurred just after a water change or within a day - no idea why and don't know if there's any correlation.

There's usually a chain reaction - when one male starts the others join in.

Babies have generally shown up 7-9 weeks later and I think they are born over the course of multiple days because I'll find a few and then a few more and after about a week I won't spot any new ones.  

 

 

[jet915]

Witnessed my first spawning today around 9 pm with my actinics on.  Only saw one rfa releasing sperm so I shut off my pumps and sucked the sperm into the turkey baster and released them into my other rfas.  Hopefully ill get some more babies in a couple months....

[KW NANOREEF]

8 hours ago, jet915 said:

Witnessed my first spawning today around 9 pm with my actinics on.  Only saw one rfa releasing sperm so I shut off my pumps and sucked the sperm into the turkey baster and released them into my other rfas.  Hopefully ill get some more babies in a couple months....

Ohhhh that’s what the white stuff is around the mouth?!? My RFA has had that for the passed couple days but I had no idea! Can they still spawn without another RFA?

[seabass]

7 minutes ago, KW NANOREEF said:

Can they still spawn without another RFA?

There are male and female RFAs.  So sexual reproduction would require one of each.  Now I have heard of people buying just one RFA, which later had babies.  However, it would have been impregnated prior to the sale.  But in your case, it appears that you got a male.

[KW NANOREEF]

10 minutes ago, seabass said:

There are male and female RFAs.  So sexual reproduction would require one of each.  Now I have heard of people buying just one RFA, which later had babies.  However, it would have been impregnated prior to the sale.  But in your case, it appears that you got a male.

Any way to sex them?

[DSFIRSTSLTWATER]

As far as I can tell there isn't any way to know.

[seabass]

22 minutes ago, KW NANOREEF said:

Any way to sex them?

Outwardly, they look the same.  So we rely on breeding observations.  So it's highly likely that you have a male (take note of that).  Obviously, a female will give birth to the babies; so if you see that, you know it's a female.  I imagine that eventually, a RFA supplier will figure out that there might be a demand for a particular sex (and sell them as such).  Hint, hint.

[DSFIRSTSLTWATER]

5 minutes ago, seabass said:

Outwardly, they look the same.  So we rely on breeding observations.  So it's highly likely that you have a male (take note of that).  Obviously, a female will give birth to the babies; so if you see that, you know it's a female.  I imagine that eventually, a RFA supplier will figure out that there might be a demand for a particular sex (and sell them as such).  Hint, hint.

I'm still waiting for my nems to reveal what they are. I have 4 of them and still not too sure yet . I still have one that wanders around it's crazy. He is never in the same spot been like that since day one lol. He found his rock that I moved and is always next to it lol. Figure its just a coincidence but a pretty crazy one. I moved his rock to the other side of the tank and he followed. Took him a week to find where it was. Pretty neat to witness.

[SeaFurn]

11 hours ago, jet915 said:

Witnessed my first spawning today around 9 pm with my actinics on.  Only saw one rfa releasing sperm so I shut off my pumps and sucked the sperm into the turkey baster and released them into my other rfas.  Hopefully ill get some more babies in a couple months....

Exciting! So when you squirted the others did any of them respond like they were eating - pulling their tentacles into their mouth?? Some of my females will do that.  And others have no response at all. 

[KW NANOREEF]

Going to pick up a RFA today. I’m excited to see what happens with the male producing sperm

[KW NANOREEF]

Just picked up a RFA. Insanely cool. White non frilly tentacles with a red/orange center! Wanna get this in my tank and see what happens!!!!

[ngvu1]

40 minutes ago, KW NANOREEF said:

Just picked up a RFA. Insanely cool. White non frilly tentacles with a red/orange center! Wanna get this in my tank and see what happens!!!!

Sounds like the one I have. 🙂

[jet915]

10 hours ago, SeaFurn said:

Exciting! So when you squirted the others did any of them respond like they were eating - pulling their tentacles into their mouth?? Some of my females will do that.  And others have no response at all. 

Yes, some of the rfas acted like they were eating when I did that....is that a clue they might be female?

[SeaFurn]

9 hours ago, jet915 said:

Yes, some of the rfas acted like they were eating when I did that....is that a clue they might be female?

I've never seen mine give birth but the one's that do that have had babies surrounding them more so than the the others...so I'm thinking that it could be. 

[seabass]

On 4/1/2016 at 6:12 PM, seabass said:

So I was just moving some RFA babies onto the rocks, and I kept noticing more showing up. I looked around and saw one giving birth. These are a little larger and more developed than the previous pics that I took. Here's the iPhone video of it giving birth:

 

I suppose, if flow is low enough, that they can remain by the mother.  However, it's been my experience that the babies can get carried by the current, and might end up almost anywhere.  Above is a video of a mother giving birth.